The Wellcome Collection in London explores connections between medicine, life and art through both physical and digital exhibitions. Mindcraft is a new Digital Story that explores a century of madness, murder and mental healing, from the arrival in Paris of Franz Anton Mesmer with his theories of ‘animal magnetism’ to the therapeutic power of hypnotism used by Freud. Through an immersive scrolling interface including image galleries, video, and interactives, the Wellcome Collection asks who really is in control of their own mind, and where does the mind’s power to harm or heal end?

A French scientist has made an interesting discovery about Leonardo da Vinci’s “Lady with an Ermine.” Using a scanning technique called layer amplification method (LAM), scientists and art historians can view and analyze what happens between layers of paint. It is now possible to see that Leonardo originally painted the portrait without the animal, then added it, but with different fur. Pascale Cotte, who developed the technique said, “The LAM technique gives us the capability to peel the painting like an onion, removing the surface to see what’s happening inside and behind the different layers of paint,” he told BBC News. “We’ve discovered that Leonardo is always changing his mind. This is someone who hesitates – he erases things, he adds things, he changes his mind again and again.”

Christie’s Auction House brought in the highest total for an auction in history last night, grossing $852.9 million at the contemporary sale in New York. New records were also set for 11 artists, among them Cy Twombly, Ed Ruscha, Peter Doig, Martin Klippenberger, and Seth Price. The stars of the night were Andy Warhol’s Triple Elvis [Ferus Type](1960) and Four Marlons (1966), which sold early going for $81.9 million and $69.6 million, respectively. “By the time the second figure was reached, the crowd—whether reeling from the action or no longer capable of being surprised or just no longer impressed by anything under $80 million—forgot to clap,” says Dan Duray from ArtNews. Although the prior nights’ Sotheby’s sale was a disappointment bringing in only $343.6 million, the two weeks of sales at both auction houses took in a total of some $2 billion, comforting many that the art market is alive and kicking.

There’s a lot more to being a professional artist than just making art full time. Artists need to organize visual records of their work, develop artist statements, maintain contact lists, and track exhibits in which their work is shown. GYST is a software program designed by artists, for working artists, to make the business aspects of being an artist much simpler.

The program, which comes in a Basic and a Pro version, allows users to easily manage the business of selling artwork. While both versions offer tools to track artwork, archive resumes and artist’s statements, and offer legal information, the Pro version offers additional tools like sample contracts, condition reports, insurance information, and the ability to track expenses for supplies. Both versions are available for a 30-day free trial and come in PC and Mac versions

GYST has also published a manual for artists, offering advice on grant writing, residencies, and gallery representation, for example. There are worksheets and a reference section as well.

The Vatican Apolostic Library has been working on a project to digitize more than 80,000 documents in its collection. Currently there are nearly 4,500 manuscripts online and there is hope that they’ll have 15,000 manuscripts available by 2018.

The collection features a variety of important and early manuscripts and books, including Pre-Columbian manuscripts, early Greek and Latin texts, Islamic manuscripts, and even some Japanese paintings.

You can browse some of the materials at DigitaVaticana here as well as on the website of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. Images can be downloaded from the digital library, but they come with a watermark and copyright statement.

Image: Sandro Botticelli, Illustrations of Dante’s Divine Comedy performed by Lorenzi il Magnifico in the 15th century. Folio 101 recto with a section of the Inferno. Reg.lat.1896A.

Have you ever wanted to eliminate the distracting background from sculpture photographed on-site? Cutting out the background can be very easy or a bit challenging, depending on how complex the image is. The magic wand tool can be a very effective tool when your background is simple in nature.

Step-by-step:

1. Select the magic wand tool from the toolbar.

2. Click on the area you want to sample. The magic wand will outline the area with flashing dotted lines.

3. Initially, the magic wand may only pick up some of the background. Use the sub-tools to add or subtract to the selection and continue clicking on the areas to add until the sculpture is isolated.

4. Use the Exposure tool to adjust the background to white or black, pulling it to the far right for white or far left for black.

5. You may need to use the clone tool to clean-up areas that the magic wand tool missed.

Flickr recently announced that they’ve developed an app for the iPad and iOS 8!

Now iPad users can view high-resolution images on the large retina dislpay screens, as well as share, fave, and comment on photos from other contributors. There are new tools for organizing your photos and a more robust search feature.

Additionally, the app includes a built-in camera interface, so photos taken with the iPad can be edited and uploaded directly into Flickr. There’s a small set of editing tools and filters, too.

For more information, visit the iTunes App Store, or stop by the VRC and check it out on our iPad!!

The Museum of Modern Art has created an App for iOS devices. Available for free from iTunes, the app features tours with curators and artists, a calendar of upcoming exhibits and events, the ability to photograph and share artwork from the museum, as well as a directory and map of the museum.

To find out more, and to watch a video about the app, visit the museum’s page

Visit the Liminal Camera on October 26th from 12-2 at the Logan Center Courtyard, 915 E. 60th Street. Made out of a shipping container, the Liminal Camera is the world’s largest pinhole camera, traversing the country by land and water. Join artists Lauren Bon, Richard Nielsen, and Tristan Duke to climb inside the camera at the Logan or head up to Depaul Art Museum for a live photo developing demo on October 29th. The Chicago Humanities Festival runs from October 25 – November 9.